Contents

Appearance

Ryōta Sakamoto

Ryōta has an average build, and he has light brown hair and brown eyes. He wears a dark grey, buttoned shirt and regular black pants with a black belt. As with any other Btooom! player, he has an IC chip implanted into his left hand.

Later on, he wears a black, long-sleeve shirt with a circle design on it. Inside the circle is the word "Btooom!" and the phrase "Soldiers, be ambitious." As seen on the cover of Btooom! 06, the circle design is light blue and the text is white.

Personality

Being a NEET, he usually stayed inside his room and played video games. He would rather socialize with people online than with people in real life.[1] He viewed his online self as more important than his real self and enjoys the virtual world more than reality. Although it was online, he still craves for social relationships. He later develops real

On the Btooom! island, Ryōta shows an unseen side of himself. Despite being initially confused by his surroundings, he quickly adapts to the survival game and proves himself to be quite proficient in it. Ryōta is also very brave and doesn't hesitate to help someone in need. For example, he saves Taira and Himiko multiple times while often risking his own life for them. If he ends up in a difficult situation, he becomes even more courageous and feels like he is another person.[2]

After Taira's death, Ryōta regrets all the hurt he's caused in the past and vows to change himself. When he and Himiko are about to experience intimate love, he notices her barely repressed fear and refuses to take advantage of her like Oda did to Aiko. Instead, he promises her that when they return to civilization they will start a life together as a couple.

History

As a young child, Ryōta's biological father never had time for him due to business. Ryōta was hurt by this lack of attention and often played children games by himself. When his parents divorced due to his father choosing work over family, Ryōta felt lonelier than before and started to take his anger and hurt out on the people around him.

When Ryōta was a high school student, he made a friend (Nobutaka Oda) which he viewed as an example in building relationships with others. Their friendship was broken when he confided in Oda that he had feelings for classmate Aiko and Oda slept with her when Ryota wouldn't make a move on her. Feeling betrayed by the first person he trusted, Ryota got into a fight with him and they were consequently expelled from school. After that, Ryōta spent all of his days playing net games without searching for a job to support himself.

In Btooom!, Sakamoto (Ryōta's player name) was a genius in combat and quickly earned fame by becoming a top ranking player (4 stars) in the world. Because of that, he was often asked by the game developer to share his ideas about future game developments. Later inside Btooom!, he met a female player (Himiko) and asked her to join his team. Both of them became close and married each other without knowing each other's real identity.

In reality, Ryōta had a bad relationship with his step father whom he verbally abused. When his step father tried to help him with his gaming addiction, Royta reacted violently and punched him. Ryōta's biological mother, unable to witness Ryōta's violent behavior, nominated Ryōta as the person she wanted to disappear without a second thought. Later on, Ryōta found himself on the deserted island inside the dangerous survival game based on Btooom.

Shortly after he realized that he and his allies Himiko and Kiyoshi Taira had (far as he knew at the time) neglected to collect the three IC chips of the bodies of Yoshiaki Imagawa (his first opponent in the island, from before he learned of the need for collecting eight chips), Mitsuo Akechi (killed by Himiko in self-defense) and Yoshihisa Kira (killed by his son). In reality, Kiyoshi Taira had collected the last two without his knowledge,[7][8][9] and someone else (perhaps Nobutaka Oda) had collected Yoshiaki Imagawa's already.[10]

Intellectual capabilities

Being ranked in the top 10 worldwide on the online game Btooom!, Ryōta can easily adapt his skills from his experiences in the online game. His quick thinking and ability to improvise has helped him to survive many encounters which otherwise would have proved to be fatal. When his enemies think they have achieved victory, Ryōta manages to outwit them at the end.